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D Hive

There may be a problem in Colony 4. There is no pollen on the base board and there are Wasps which are not being challenged at the entrance. This suggests that supersedure or swarming may have left them without a Queen. There is evidence that mature brood is still hatching out.

The Wasps are becoming more persistent. I saw at least half a dozen around the hives at dawn. If they get access to the hives then they'll rob until there are no stores left.

There might be other reasons why there isn't any dropped pollen. They might not be finding flowers (although other hives have pollen on their base boards). They might be really careful.

Colony 13 is dropping Varroa. They are also cleaning out old comb so there is a lot of debris on the hive floor. I found 2 or maybe 3 Varroa bodies.

This colony is new to my apiary, having been established elsewhere. I haven't really included it in my Varroa Zero post because it's new. Hives D and G are included. There were no Varroa on the floor of either this morning. There doesn't appear to much activity in Hive D at all. I shall have to check them.

I regularly examine the floors of my hives. The stuff which falls out of the hive tells a story about what the bees are doing. I always look for Varroa mites. I've found none on the floors of any of my hives for several weeks. I don't know why.

Mites on the hive floor can indicate how many mites are living in the colony. Varroa live for between 27 days to about 5 months (source: Managing Varroa, National Bee Unit, 2017). The mites require bee brood to reproduce so it's not surprising that there are fewer mites in the early part of the year. What is surprising is that I'm finding no dead Varroa at all in well established and very active hives.

We had difficult weather in spring. The temperature started to warm and then fell dramatically. This led to a number of colonies dying of complete starvation or isolation starvation. Dead colonies don't support Varroa. Live colonies do, but only in cells with brood. I wonder whether this has interrupted the mite life-cycle and knocked them back. I do not expect to find any colonies where Varroa are entirely absent.

I have 6 occupied hives. Three of these are new colonies. I expect to have lower drop anyway because they arrive only with those Varroa which cling on to swarming bees (during the phoretic part of mite life cycle). I have one established hive where there is an Ant infestation. It's possible that the Ants are taking away the mite bodies. That leaves two established colonies which have brood but are dropping no mites. That's a small number of hives, but striking anyway.

Three hives in the out apiary appear healthy. It's still too cold for them to fly but there's detritus on on the removable screen beneath the brood nests.

It's less clear how Hive A is in Headington. The Ants are active on the removable board. There's some evidence of activity. The hive still has supers on because the brood nest moved up. It always appears to be very big so I assume that it's strong. Let's hope that's still true in a fortnight.

It's cold, so there isn't much to see at the hives. I'm still keeping an eye on the colonies by inspecting the removable base boards.

All the hives (C, D, E, F, G) are showing evidence that they're uncapping honey and eating it. There are some darker cappings which indicates that brood may be hatching. The colour of the wax suggests that it is from brood comb but the cause is not certain. They might be tidying or repairing damage. Midwinter brood is more common than some literature suggests so I'd be confident that they're still rearing.

Varroa drop count is very low (<10 per hive). That's also not much of a surprise. If there is brood then it's likely to be very heavily infested with Varroa. I'll look out for crawling bees showing signs of Deformed Wing Virus. I didn't see any this time but the numbers are low enough (and the ground wet enough) that I might have missed them.

I visited my out-apiary today and examined the removable hive floors for evidence of recent activity.

Three hives (D, F and G) show evidence of recent brood emergence. There were also hundreds of dead mites. Hive D had been especially prolific. There was also crystallised sugar which suggests that old honey is being eaten or cells are being cleaned out.

One hive (C) was so wet with condensation that it was impossible to tell what had fallen to the floor. There must have been wax and pollen. Presumably mites but it was hard to tell. The hive is ventilated but I assume that there has been a strong honey flow and the ventilation has been insufficient.

One Hive (E) was in crisis but activity seems much reduced. Fewer mites and fewer hatchings. This might mean that the crisis has abated or that the colony is in deep trouble.

The overall picture is that foraging is still strong during the warmer parts of the day. Brood rearing is strong which is supporting very high levels of mites. This picture is matched by Hives A and H in Headington. A is dropping lots of mites. Both A and H are bringing in large amounts of pollen. H is building lots of comb (which A doesn't need to do).

The Varroa population models suggest that colonies risk collapse when total mite numbers is greater than 1,000. I would only be confident that hive H has fewer than that.

What happens next? This is where my commitment to no-treatment beekeeping is tested.

I harvested 5 different honeys this season. It's been a privilege to compare them and see the differences.

There were 2 from Hive A. The first was a spring honey, collected in April and harvested in May. The likely nectar source was Horse Chestnut which flowers around this time and is in a nearby park. The second was some old, dark honey which I removed from deeper in Hive A. I'm not sure when it was harvested. It was less distinctive than the other honeys. The bees were very reluctant to clear from the super, perhaps because the frames had been used for brood at some point.

There was a peculiar honey from Hive E. It seems to have been collected in a single nectar flow but the comb was bizarrely wonky, almost making a star shape. The honey was dark and viscous with a flavour described as caramel or stewed fruit. I wondered whether it might have been from Honeydew. The bees were very defensive around that time which may have been related.

There were 2 supers of honey from Hives C and D. I took one from Hive C in June which was light and tasty. It appears to have been collected in May so Hawthorn may have been a large part of the nectar. The second was from Hive D, harvested in July. It had a slight minty taste.

Comparing the honeys showed their differences. The colour varied significantly; the clarity varied according to the granulation of the honey; the flavours were very distinctive. The favourite honey seems to have been the spring honey from Hive A, probably from Horse Chestnut. The dark honey from Hive E split opinion.

In trying to write about the flavours, I'm reminded how difficult it is to describe flavour except by simile: all flavours are described as being like some other flavour. This makes a merry-go-round of the description. I can say with confidence that these all tasted very much like honey.

I had a look into the hives in my out-apiary yesterday. There hasn't been much going on during July to comment on.

All the hives are showing activity. but either there isn't much nectar or they're working on brood production. All the usual pollen, Varroa and cappings which show brood activity. Very little new wax and generally little expansion in stores within the supers.

I think that there has been less nectar, or that the bees have had to travel further for it. Maybe they're expanding brood but I don't have evidence for that.

The wasps have arrived in force, and I found that Hive H was under attack. I had moved the colony from a nucleus hive (containing 5 frames) into a full sized commercial brood body. I placed the frames at the back, away from the entrance. The idea was to encourage comb and brood development at the front of the hive. The actual effect has been to leave the door less well guarded. I found several wasps inside the hive, and the bees were closely covering the brood comb. I moved the comb to the front and reduced the entrance to under 3cm wide.

Hive H has apparently produced no Varroa on its' removable floor. There is another possible explanation - that the wasps have been eating the fallen mites, along with some bees.

Elsewhere, I found that Hive D had a super which was almost full. I placed an empty super and a clearer board beneath it. I hope to have some honey from them in a week or so.

In July last year I wrote about angry bees and fear. I have the fear again.

Hive E is very cross. I think that it may be low on stores. I tried to take the lid off to feed it. They went for me in full attack mode. Buzzng my head and my hands. My legs had at least a dozen bees attached, all trying to sting me.

The fear is my own fault. My body is well covered in a bee suit. My hands are fairly well covered in leather gloves (but nitrile over the top would be better). It's my ankles. They sting my ankles. I went back in and put on thick socks.

I took the lid off and put a good dollop of set honey on the crown board. I was covered in angry bees. I put the lid on and ran round the corner. These bees stay angry and they follow for over 20 metres. I did an I'm covered in bees dance. Still covered. I hid in the corridor which leads to the roof and swept them off. Eventually I got them all off.

Cautiously I went back to the corner to collect my things. Oh dear. In my haste I didn't put the lid on properly. I walked back to the hive, replaced the lid and ran around the corner again. Once more the dance. Once more the lengthy removal of a dozen or more bees. Finally, I was free to leave.

Before I left I had a quick look at all of the floors. Hives C, E and F all showed very heavy Varroa fall. Hives D and G had very few Varroa, but I might have cleared the floor more recently than the others.

Edit: there was a very noticeable smell when I opened Hive E. I can't describe it but it wasn't nectar or one of the normal smells. I assume that it's the smell of alarm.